


Funhouse

by Gia279



Series: Practice Ficlets [6]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: County Fairs, Demons, Destiny, Imps - Freeform, M/M, Magic!Stiles, One Shot, Portals to other Realms, Psychics, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 16:01:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13744395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gia279/pseuds/Gia279
Summary: They had to cut around a ring toss and two people who tried to talk to Stiles about his destiny. Hehatedmediums. They were so pretentious.





	Funhouse

**Author's Note:**

> **Prompt:** “Chasing the enemy”
> 
> Once again, I hit the 2k word mark and kept right on. Ugh.

Stiles ran faster than he’d ever run before; he swore, if he went any faster, his feet would leave the ground. Bystanders gave him nasty looks as he shoved his way through the crowd. A woman in heels wobbled as his shoulder knocked into hers.

“Sorry!” he gasped, and kept running. Somewhere, Coach Bobby Finstock was feeling incredibly furious and he couldn’t figure out why. Stiles bore down and pushed faster.

Ashes sprinkled down over his face, making him jerk back and sputter. 

The performer grinned at him. “The rose ashes landing in that pattern on you means you’ll meet your true love very soon.” He traced a line down Stiles’s cheek, making him flinch. “Destiny says she’ll be a petite blonde and you’ll fall in love with her sunny disposition.”

Someone behind Stiles snorted at the same time he did. 

He shook himself. “Uh, thanks, but I’ve got—got to go.” He stepped away, wiped his face, and started running again.

A group across the path started singing at the karaoke booth, loudly and off-key. 

Stiles didn’t _hate_ the county fair. Fairs were fun, but Beacon Hills didn’t do them the way everyone else did. Beacon Hills did county fairs _big_. Something about the town made real magic stronger; it drew sensitives to the town like moths to light. They all got together and made the two weeks the county fair lasted into a truly spectacular show.

Stiles had stopped being amazed by it when he was ten. He mostly avoided the whole affair, but this time he didn’t have the luxury of that. 

“Where are you going?”

Stiles kept running. It was the guy who’d snorted at the true love/destiny thing, who was totally fake, by the way, rose ashes weren’t even good for reading destinies. 

“Hey. I said _where are you going?_ ” He grabbed Stiles’s arm and yanked him around. 

Stiles threw his grip off, infuriated. “Don’t grab people,” he snapped.

“Sorry.” He didn’t look sorry, he looked foreboding, and Stiles suddenly realized he was working security for the fair. He was wearing a leather jacket over his black ‘Security’ shirt. “Why are you running?”

“Because—my pet escaped,” Stiles improvised. “It’s somewhere here, and I have to catch up.”

“What kind of pet? You aren’t supposed to have pets at the-”

“Listen,” Stiles snapped, “he escaped and I paid the entrance fee to get in here to chase him, even though I _hate_ being here, so if you don’t let me go, I’m going to be pissed.”

“What kind of animal…sir?”

“A parakeet!” Stiles blurted. “Okay?! It’s a yellow and green parakeet and I _need_ to catch it.”

His brows furrowed. “How did-?”

“No time,” Stiles snapped. “Move!”

“Alright. Let’s go get him then.” The security guy nodded sharply. 

Stiles didn’t have time to be surprised about this turn of events. He started running again, following the lit path that only he could see. The tracking spell was thankfully still functional, despite the crowd and interference. 

The security guy didn’t ask how Stiles knew where to go; if anything, it seemed like he was trying to take the lead. Even weirder, he was trying to lead them in the right direction.

“What’s your name?” Stiles panted, suspicious.

“Derek,” he grunted. He spared him a glance. “You?”

“Stiles.” He dodged a hammer as a woman swung it back to slam on the high striker. “Thanks for your help,” he added grudgingly. 

“How did it get out?” Derek asked.

“Um, just—accidentally left a door open.” Which was not exactly a lie. He just…didn’t mean the door Derek probably thought he meant. 

“Right.”

They had to cut around a ring toss and two people who tried to talk to Stiles about his destiny. He _hated_ mediums. They were so pretentious. 

“-but you—”

“No time, thanks anyway!” he yelled.

“They’re persistent today,” Derek observed. He was annoyingly unbothered by all the running.

“They’re getting an unintentional boost,” Stiles muttered. Stupid freaking parakeet. He winced when he felt Derek looking at him. 

He didn’t say anything, though.

“Sir, are you aware of your aura?!” a psychic called at him.

“Yep, definitely.” 

“I’ll give you a free reading!” she yelled. “Let me look into your future!” She muttered something else about his aura, looking awestruck.

“Already seen it, thanks!” 

A medium laughed. “Yes, you have,” he said. He had a lot of real magic hanging around him, rather than the tiny bit the rest had, which meant he’d sensed Stiles’s magic. 

Stiles made a face at him and kept running. The trail led to the house of mirrors. “Oh, no,” he groaned. He bent over his knees to catch his breath. 

Derek frowned at the entrance. “How did a parakeet get in there?”

Stiles wiped his face. “Are you, um. Are you from here?” He saw the odd look on Derek’s face and straightened up. “You know. _Beacon Hills native?_ ” 

“Yeah, I’m from here.” He squinted, then his eyes widened. “And you’re a witch.”

Stiles scowled. “Shh! Don’t say that so loud.” He looked around, but no one was paying him any attention. They were far more interested in the people dressed like crystal peddlers and flower children, which was how Stiles liked it.

“You could make a ton of money here,” Derek observed. “With the amount of power you have, fortunes must be simple.”

Stiles grimaced. “Not worth it, not in any capacity.” 

Derek crossed his arms, revealing part of his nametag. “So what are we chasing, really?”

“It’s shaped like a parakeet. It’s sort of…an imp,” Stiles sighed. 

“An imp?”

“Sounds harmless, I know. It isn’t. It’s a less powerful version of a demon, wreaks more havoc than a demon would ever want to.”

“Demons _don’t_ want to wreak havoc?” he asked doubtfully. 

“They don’t care what we do, unless we want something from them.” Stiles shrugged. “Look, I just need you to put that _Security_ shirt to good use and clear the house of mirrors out.” 

Derek glared. “Can’t we wait until it comes out?”

“No. It’s a demonic entity in a room full of mirrors and sugar-high children. Bad combo, disastrous ending in sight.” Stiles snapped a hand out and revealed Derek’s full name tag. “ _Hale._ You’re a werewolf. Perfect.”

“How so?”

“ _Imp._ ” Stiles waved a hand. “Please, just close the mirror house. For a little while. Say someone got sick in there or something.” 

Derek sighed. “Why should I?”

Stiles’s jaw dropped open. “What? Because there’s an _imp loose_? Because you’re security? Because you’re a werewolf?”

He shrugged. “Sounds like a witch problem to me.”

“Fine! What do you want?”

He smirked. “Read my future.”

Stiles’s face screwed up with rage. “ _What?!_ ”

“You heard me. That’s my price.”

He thought he might hit him in his smug face. “I could make up a bunch of bullshit and you wouldn’t know.”

“Sure I would. But you won’t.” 

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah. Unless you’re as bad as the spiritualists here.” His eyes widened innocently. “Are you going to tell me about my soulmate? Tell me she’s a redhead.” 

Stiles bared his teeth. “Fine. I’ll give you a reading— _after_ we deal with the imp.”

“Fine,” Derek said, suddenly cheerful.

Someone shrieked in the mirror house.

“Your fault!” Stiles snapped, running for the steps. 

To his credit, Derek didn’t hesitate. He pushed in front of Stiles so he entered the mirror house first. “Please exit the hall,” he called out, projecting his voice surprisingly well. “We need to close it for routine maintenance.” He turned and started messing with a discreet control panel to the right of the door. Bright fluorescent lights came on, and a lit path of tiny green lights appeared on the floor. “Please follow the green lights to the door.”

“Nice.” Stiles stepped around him. “I’m going to look. He’s here somewhere.” 

Derek nodded. He stayed by the door, ushering people out.

Stiles found the boy who’d shrieked, hands over his face in between two mirrors. “Hey, buddy, it’s okay. You can leave.”

“No! The monster said if I move, it’ll eat me.”

Stiles’s mouth compressed. Monster, huh? Little pest thought highly of itself. “Well, I’m magic, so I’ll protect you.” 

The boy didn’t uncover his face, but Stiles knew he had his attention. “Magic? Are you a wizard?”

Super outdated term, but- “Sure. Why don’t you drop your hands?”

“My eyeballs fell out,” he whispered. “Last time I looked in the mirror. So I’m holding them in, just in case.” 

Stiles was going to pluck each one of its tiny demonic feathers. “That was probably just the mirror. But it won’t happen again. I promise.” He gestured at the boy, to be safe, casting a protective circle to keep illusions away. 

The boy shivered and lifted his face. Thankfully, his eyes were right where they belonged. The imp only had enough power to make it look bad, Stiles knew, but still… “Thank you.”

“Sure. Now, where’s the monster?”

“Up there,” the boy said solemnly, pointing at the ceiling. “Do you work at the fair? Is that why you’re magic?”

“Yep, totally. The fair always has a monster wrangler.” Stiles looked up and spotted the imp perched on an exposed pipe above their heads. “Why don’t you head outside, pal, while I handle this guy?”

“Will you walk me?”

Stiles looked down, then back up at the imp. He bit back a sigh. “Sure.”

The boy, who was probably about six, grabbed Stiles’s hand as they headed toward the door. They followed the green-lit path easily enough. 

Derek’s face did a little spasm that looked painful at the sight of them. 

“He found it,” Stiles muttered. “Okay, buddy, Derek will help you find your-”

“That’s my son,” a woman just outside snapped. “Come on, Robert, let’s go. You should have come out as soon as you heard them!” 

“Yikes. Good luck, Robert,” Stiles said. 

“Who is your manager?” the woman demanded, shooting him a nasty look.

He turned to Derek. “Anyway, I’m going to go finish the maintenance.”

The woman held out her hand sharply.

Robert heaved a sigh and followed her down the stairs. 

Derek shut the door. “She was worried.”

“Cool. The beast is this way. You can watch the door if you’d prefer,” he added over his shoulder. 

Derek followed him.

The imp, still in parakeet form, dove at Stiles’s face, twittering and scratching his cheek. “Ow! You little bastard.” Stiles wiped his face and twisted around. “Okay. You block that hall.” He pointed until Derek moved. Stiles threw a shield around the openings as a precaution. 

The imp, now panicking, started flying around frantically, squawking.

“Don’t freak out,” Stiles warned. 

“Why would I-”

Stiles tuned him out and knelt down, muttering under his breath. The chant was mostly to focus the magic coursing through him. 

A mirror shattered behind him; his eyes flew open in time to see shards of reflective glass raining down over him. Bits and pieces of Derek were reflected back at him, glimmering but too broken up to make a complete picture. “Ooh,” he said. Suddenly, all of the psychics losing their shit around him made sense. 

A chill seeped over him from the broken mirror frame, drawing his attention.

He stood and faced it. “Yeah, that’s right, Efeni, I caught him.” 

The creature blinked several eyes at him. 

“Pay up, and I’ll open it wide enough to let you grab him.”

A loud, floor-shaking sigh emerged, followed by a cloudy, almost liquid appendage stretching out of the mirror frame.

Derek made a strangled noise behind him.

Stiles held his hand out, palm up.

Efeni’s finger things uncurled, and jewels tumbled into Stiles’s palm. 

“Thanks.” He pushed at the portal until it widened enough. 

Efeni crept further out, one milk-white limb after another, and snatched the parakeet out of the air. On contact, it lost its shape, slipping into its original seven-legged form. 

“Keep better track of him,” Stiles said sternly. 

Efeni chittered at him, retreating through the portal.

The glass flew back into the frame as it closed, cracks disappearing as if they were never there. Stiles looked back at Derek, who looked pale himself. “Heh, yeah, I’ve got an affinity for portals.” He stuffed the jewels in his pocket. “We should talk,” he said softly, remembering the glass.

“Sure,” Derek replied faintly. “Talk.” He blinked and looked at the mirror. “Was that…a demon?”

Stiles glanced over his shoulder automatically, though he knew what he was talking about. “Yeah, it was.” He cleared his throat.

Derek nodded slowly. “Right.” He blinked around at the other mirrors. 

“Cool. So I have to go. Meet me at Barb’s Diner at four thirty so we can talk. I’ll do your,” his mouth twisted, “reading then. Sound good? Good! Bye.” He fled, like a coward, without letting Derek respond to anything he said. 

 

When Stiles was thirteen, he looked into his future. He’d been feeling low and unlovable, as kids sometimes did when they were being angsty teenagers. Most kids didn’t have magic, though. Stiles did. So he’d searched for his true love, had gotten back the broken images of a man that he’d tried to piece together for years. Glittering, moving pieces that hadn’t made sense then.

Stiles had given up trying to piece it together a long time ago. He’d just assumed it meant either he wasn’t supposed to be looking for himself, or it meant he…didn’t have anyone in the future. Just broken fragments of possibility. 

Stiles went to the diner at four fifteen anyway. He was completely freaked out, he didn't know if he should tell Derek or not, and he ended up ordering a table full of food.

Four thirty came and went. Then five. Stiles had stress-eaten most of the food. By five fifteen, he was considering leaving, disheartened, when Derek dropped into the booth across from him. 

His hair was disheveled, face flushed. “My shift,” he gasped, “didn’t end until four forty-five.” 

“Oh. Sorry.”

He glared, still breathing hard. 

Stiles ordered an ice water for him. “So.” He cleared his throat. “What kind of reading did you want?”

“What?” Derek snapped. 

Stiles swallowed. “You wanted a reading. I need to know what to look for. I’m not great at broad readings, but specific ones I’m fine at. I’m better at portals and dimensions and stuff,” he added. He picked at a tear in the vinyl under his leg, nervous. “So…future? Or past lives? Love? Money?” He tried not to wince on the _love_ part of that, but he must’ve done something, because Derek’s gaze sharpened. “I can look for future job prospects, or-”

“Love,” Derek interrupted. “Why did you cringe?”

Stiles sighed and held out a hand. “It has potential to be awkward,” he lied. “That’s all.” He shook his hand impatiently. “I need your hand,” he croaked.

Derek frowned, then dropped his hand in Stiles’s.

Stiles closed his eyes, searching forward. He grimaced when he saw himself, kneeling, head ducked against a shower of mirror fragments. He tried to go past that, seek others, but the hand on his flexed and yanked suddenly. A cup rattled as he was pulled halfway across the table, and a mouth was on his. He gasped, his hand clenching. His eyes flew open. 

Derek let him go.

He slipped back into his seat, dazed. “Could you—did you—how did you…did you see that?”

“Yeah. I’m a werewolf, we’re basically conduits for magic. I live in _Beacon Hills_ ,” Derek said flatly. “Do you think this is the first reading I’ve ever had?” 

Stiles flinched, trying to pull his hand free.

Derek held on. “Why didn’t you tell me? I know you knew. That’s why you freaked out at the fair, that’s why all the psychics kept trying to talk to you. They sensed we’d met.”

“ _So?_ ” Stiles burst out. “I was scared! People aren’t supposed to know things like this.” He glared at their laced fingers. 

Derek was silent a beat. “Well, maybe I don’t want to be your “destined true love”.”

Stiles cringed. “Yeah, I-”

“Maybe I need some convincing,” Derek continued as if he hadn’t spoken. His thumb stroked the back of his hand, soothing despite his tone. “Because you aren’t great at readings, you said so yourself. For all I know, you just showed me a glimpse of my past on accident.”

“So what you’re saying is you want to date me?” Stiles asked, smiling a little. 

“No.” Before he could react to that, Derek went on, “I want _you_ to take _me_ on dates. I mean, you can’t even read my future, so you’ve got to impress me somehow. Show me what you bring to the table.” He smirked. 

Stiles swallowed a laugh. “Okay, smartass. And how’re you going to impress _me?_ ”

Derek smirked. “I’ve got some ideas.”


End file.
